Page 36 of White Rabbit

“Oh, it does. The Family calls me Rosie and my friends call me Ro.” She laughs, “And others call me the Queen of Hearts, but that’s another story.”

“I’m here to pick something up for...a friend of ours” I whisper, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear, suddenly self-conscious of the dullness of my brown hair.

She snorts, “If you’re just his friend then I’m a pinecone, girl.”

I frown as she pulls me into a booth. “Did you know who I was? At the auction?”

“Of course I did.” She taps her red nails against the table before waving over a waitress and asking them to bring out two coffees and a slice of cake. “Jay told me not to approach you, he thought I’d scare you off.”

A teenager wearing a shirt and bowtie comes over, balancing a tray carefully. They’re wearing long false eyelashes and a bold red lipstick.

Grinning up at the server as they place my coffee in front of me, Rosie says, “Thank you, Nyx. I’m loving that shade on you today!”

“Cato helped me choose it,” a soft masculine voice replies, as Nyx pouts their lips a little before walking away.

When she catches me staring, she offers a small shrug. “My staff are always welcome to express themselves. It’s something my husband and I feel strongly about.”

I find myself nodding, because I’d read about how Rosie was a big advocate for authenticity on the website for the auction.

“Back to the auction. Creed thinks he can keep secrets, and use Cato to help him? No. Not happening.” She flashes me an unimpressed look as she flicks her blonde hair back over her shoulder. “He may be Jay’s ‘Left Hand’, but I’m the wife and nothing gets past me.”

The pieces were slotting into place, and I felt like kicking myself. Creed was the Left Hand of The Family, the mafia organization in Newtown. Rosie’s husband Jay was also none other than Julian Asaro. Which meant…Julian Asaro was the head of the mafia? The celebrity philanthropist with the gorgeous wife went around selling drugs, dealing firearms and killing people? It didn’t make sense.

“Oh, sweetie pie,” she pushes the slice of decadent chocolate cake towards me with a fork. “Are you only just realizing how deep in the trenches you are?”

Pushing my fork into the moist cake, I play with it for a moment before lifting a bite to my lips. It tastes incredible, the chocolate rich and sweet. What was I signing up for here? What was I hoping to achieve?

Rosie sits back and pulls out a small dagger with a ruby glinting in the handle as she twists it between her fingers. She looks speculative for a moment before tilting her head with a soft sigh. “Are we going to have a problem? I thought I’d made a new friend.”

Straightening in my seat, I offer her a small smile. This world may not be mine, but I wasn’t a pushover. “Don’t threaten me, Ro. I’m here because Creed asked me to come. My only allegiance is to myself. I don’t care what you do, or who you work for. It’s none of my business.”

And it was true.

By deciding to let Creed in, I had to wrap my head around the fact that I was no longer on the right side of the law. The skeletons in his closet weren’t something I could ignore, but I could avoid getting caught in the middle. I would keep my mouth shut and just focus on whatever this was developing between us. My father was on one side of my life, and Creed on the other, and I would have to exist in the space between until I knew how Creed really felt about me.

“Oh, I knew I liked you.” Ro laughs, spinning her blade like it’s a toy. “Creed doesn’t keep women around. He doesn’t let just anyone work with him, which means you’re different from the others.”

“He needs me.” I offer weakly as she makes me face the fact that I’m a convenience. He needs a prison officer to smuggle something in for him, and I’m an obvious choice.

“Honey, he’s probably already running that little shithole of a prison—that’s what he does. He’s only in there because he wants to be.” She rolls her pretty blue eyes. “He doesn’t need you for that. No. He wants you. There’s a difference.”

She gives me this strange secret smile as she finally pockets her weapon and takes a sip of her coffee.

“I don’t understand what you’re implying.”

“That’s because you’re in denial. Burn the world, remember?” Making a tutting noise, I see the smile she’s trying to hide behind her cup.

We sit together, drinking our coffee, not saying anything for a while. People come and go, and wonder if they know a mafia queen runs this little diner? Rosie doesn’t seem to hide who she is, unafraid of embracing the darkness with a smile and a killer wardrobe.

“Take these, give them to him.” Her hands dip inside her apron and she hands me three small yellow balls, the kind you get inside chocolate eggs that usually hide a tiny toy. “And Ava, tell him to stop sneaking around behind my back with Cato, or I’ll be forced to make another addition to the KC and he won’t like it.”

What the hell was inside them that was so important? And what the fuck was the KC?

“I’ll be seeing you around, Ava Bishop.” Getting to her feet, Ro strokes my cheek with an excited gleam in her eyes. “I can’t wait to see how this plays out.”

She laughs as sashays away, disappearing back into the kitchen with a wave.

The entire evening had to be one of the strangest things that’s happened to me recently, and I can’t say I hated it.

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